Lech ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 64 (2024) 449–455 ISSN 2159-3159 Article copyright held by the author(s) and made available under the Creative Commons Attribution License CC-BY https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ From the mountains to the sea: Colluthus’ De Raptu Helenae 7 Marcel Lysgaard Lech N COLLUTHUS’ small poem on the events leading up to the Trojan War,1 the narrator calls upon the Trojan nymphs of the river Xanthus to tell him what Paris did (5–10):2 δεῦτε, θεµιστοπόλοιο νοήµατα µηλοβοτῆρος ἔσπετέ µοι, κελάδοντος ἀπορνύµεναι ποταµοῖο, †ἠνορέων† πόθεν ἦλθεν, ἀήθεα πόντον ἐλαύνων, ἀγνώσσων ἁλὸς ἔργα· τί δὲ χρέος ἔπλετο νηῶν ἀρχεκάκων, ἵνα πόντον ὁµοῦ καὶ γαῖαν ὀρίνῃ βουκόλος; Come and tell me the thoughts of the shepherd judge, depart from the noisy river and tell me how he †bravely† came, sailing the unfamiliar sea ignorant of the labours of the deep! Why the need of ships, the source of disaster that made him stir both sea and land, a cowherd? In recent editions of The Rape of Helen, the editors3 have followed the reading ἠνορέων of M (Paris.gr. Suppl. 388), instead of the reading ἐξ ὀρέων of b (the MSS. stemming from Bessarion’s MS., 1 For a general introduction, see Cosetta Cadau, Studies in Colluthus’ Abduction of Helen (Leiden 2015). 2 I cite the text from Orestis Karavas, Κόλλουθος: Ἑλένης ἁρπαγή (Athens 2015). All translations are my own. 3 F. J. Cuartero i Iborra, Col·lut, El Rapte d’Hèlena (Barcelona 1992): “per què vingeú, baronívol”; Karavas, Κόλλουθος: “τὴν ἀνδρεία ποῦ τὴ βρῆκε.” I 450 FROM THE MOUNTAINS TO THE SEA ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 64 (2024) 449–455 called β by Livrea) adopted by earlier editors.4 It has been argued5 that if we read ἠνορέων and understand it as being applied to the subject (sc. Paris), it would be a metapoetic and ironic judgement on Paris by the narrator. Although ἠνορέων is indeed the lectio difficilior, there are some objections, I believe, against following this principle in this case. First, the noun ἠνορέη6 occurs elsewhere in the poem (140, 145, 164, 277), and there Colluthus follows the practice in Homer, as it is always used in the singular and as an abstraction, as in 140 where Athena calls herself ἠνορέης ἐπίκουρον. This makes perfect sense in terms of the Homeric usage of the word, as she offers to teach Paris about wars and ἠνορέην (145), just as the gods gave Bellerophontes ἠνορέην in Il. 6.156–157, and pre- cisely this Homeric passage becomes the target of Colluthus’ erudite playing: in 163 Aphrodite offers Paris Helen instead of ἠνορέη (ἀντὶ µὲν ἠνορέης ἐρατὴν παράκοιτιν ὀπάσσω) echoing Homer’s ἠνορέην ἐρατεινὴν of Bellerophontes7—not wittingly but 4 Such as A. W. Mair, Oppian, Colluthus and Tryphiodorus (Cambridge [Mass.] 1928); E. Livrea, Colluto, Il ratto di Elena (Bologna 1968); P. Orsini, Collouthos, L’enlèvement d’Hélène (Paris 1972); O. Schönberger, Kolluthos, Raub der Helena (Würzburg 1993), although he strongly considers M’s reading (57 ad loc.). F. Possebon, M. Marques Júnior, A. L. Albertim. Colutos, O rapto de Helena (João Pessoa 2005), and M. Baumbach, Griechische Kleinepik (Berlin 2019), retain the reading of b. For other readings consult Livrea, Colluto. 5 G. Giangrande, review of Livrea, Colluto, JHS 89 (1969) 149–154, at 149 (see below); S. Kotseleni, Colluthus, The Rape of Helen, A Stylistic Commentary (diss. KC London 1990) 118–119; Cuartero i Iborra, Col·lut 97 n.4; Karavas, Κόλλουθος ad loc. 6 On the meaning of this word see B. Graziosi and J. Haubold, “Homeric Masculinity: ἠνορέη and ἀγηνορίη,” JHS 123 (2003) 60–76. But as the authors clearly show, ἠνορέη denotes the sort of bravery that confirms the social cohesion of the soldiers, not “power, strength, audacity” as in Kotseleni, Colluthus 118. 7 Colluthus’ ἀριστεύουσι γυναῖκες (162) neatly echoes Glaucon’s boast (Il. 6.208, αἰὲν ἀριστεύειν καὶ ὑπείροχον ἔµµεναι ἄλλων), the earliest instance of the verb ἀριστεύειν; Aphrodite will grant (ὀπάσσω) Paris Helen as the gods had granted (ὤπασαν 6.157) Bellerophontes his abilities. MARCEL LYSGAARD LECH 451 ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 64 (2024) 449–455 tragically, for Bellerophontes’ ἠνορέη ἐρατεινή causes his disas- trous ménage à trois with Proetus and Anteia, parallel to Paris, Helen, and Menelaus. Colluthus stresses the tragic by focusing on the ἐρατὴ παράκοιτις, Helen, not the more positive ἠνορέη among the Homeric heroes. Colluthus clearly plays with Homer, but even when Achilles in Colluthus’ pre-Trojan War world is known for his ἠνορέη (275), Colluthus expects his reader to know what Achilles in the Iliad is (or rather will become): “As the ἀγήνωρ man par excellence (cf. 9.699: ὃ δ’ ἀγήνωρ ἐστὶ καὶ ἄλλως), he does not have sufficient consideration for others.”8 Colluthus’ poem may seem light and witty on the surface, but his intertextual ironies often revel in the uncanny. If we follow the ironic/metapoetic reading as introduced above and take ἠνορέων as an adjective or participle, i.e. “the brave Paris came…,” the form ἠνορέων becomes difficult to ex- plain. Adjectives from the ἠνορ- stem seem to prefer the third declension -ήνωρ ending (e.g. εὐήνωρ, ἀγήνωρ), and though we find the adjective ἀνόρεος in Sophocles (fr.436), the ending -έων would thus seem to signal a genitive plural rather than a nom- inative singular. A genitive seems at first glance the most obvious form when taken together with πόθεν ἦλθεν,9 but then Colluthus would be talking about Paris’ forebears, not Paris, and nothing in the text supports such a thought. The plural use of ἠνορέη meaning “manly exploits” as found in Pindar (dative ἀνορέαις Pyth. 8.91, Nem. 3.20, Isth. 4.11) has its merits here, but the construction ἦλθεν with a genitive seems strange with ἠνορέων (“coming from manly deeds”). Furthermore, in contemporary 8 Graziosi and Haubold, JHS 123 (2003) 67. 9 M. Minniti Colonna, “Sul testo e sulla lingua di Colluto,” Vichiana 8 (1979) 70–93, proposes ἐξ ὀρέων ποθὲν, but πόθεν ἦλθεν is a variation of the Homeric formular τίς εἴη καὶ πόθεν ἔλθοι (Od. 15.423, 17.368), though Col- luthus tends to follow Nonnus’ more flexible placement of πόθεν within a dactylic hexameter (e.g. Dion. 23.79, 30.170, 40.338) than that of the Homeric meter. πόθεν here means “why” or “how” as it often does in Nonnus (e.g. Dion. 1.24, 8.78), see Livrea, Colluto ad loc. 452 FROM THE MOUNTAINS TO THE SEA ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 64 (2024) 449–455 epic, the genitive plural is always ἠνορεάων, not ἠνορέων, e.g. Christod. 2.399, Dioscorus fr.2.13. Thus, the genitive plural is out of the question. Colluthus then could have created a hitherto unrecorded verb ἠνορέω by analogy with ἀγηνορέω and the form ὑπερηνορέων, but this seems to me a desperate course, since his hapaxes are always composita, not the undoing of composites.10 As noted above, Giangrande opted for an ironic use of ἠνορέων and argued that ἐξ ὀρέων is a “lectio facilior and trivialisation.”11 I agree about the former, but it is not a trivialisation, for even without ἠνορέων, the narrator passes judgement on Paris: the ἀήθεα sea is ἀήθεα only to Paris,12 and coming from the mountains, he is of course ignorant (ἀγνώσσων)13 of the sea and of ships, with disastrous results. Here Colluthus follows the wording of Nonnus (Dion. 1.101 of Zeus stealing Europa), but the motif of Hesiod (Op. 659), who relates his only experience of sailing from Aulis, from which, Hesiod reminds us, the Greeks set out for Troy, just as the inexperienced Paris sets out for Greece.14 10 This is clear from the list in Cuartero i Iborra, Col·lut, 58. 11 JHS 89 (1969) 149. 12 For related passages see Nonn. Dion. 23.179 (ἀήθεα πορθµὸν), 38.409 (ἀήθεος Ὠκεανοῖο), and perhaps 39.366. It is possible that Colluthus also had in mind Quintus Smyrn. 2.638 (γαῖαν … ἀήθεα) and 6.267 (ἀήθεα χῶρον) for the obvious contrast between earth and sea in 9. The Trojans were warned against seafaring (Hellanicus FGrHist 4 F 142), but Colluthus might also be alluding to Jason and the Argonauts, traditionally the first sailors (cf. n.17 below). In Dion. 4.232 we may see in Cadmus (preparing to sail off with Har- monia) a contrast to our Paris: ναυτιλίης νοέων πατρώιον ἠθάδα τέχνην, and 4.286–287, where in contrast to Paris, Cadmus gives up his seafaring to travel by land. 13 Colluthus plays with Nonn. Dion. 1.424–425 ἄρκυν ὀλέθρου / ἀγνώσσων and Triph. 312, 585, all of which portray unawareness of the impending doom. 14 On Colluthus’ Hesiodic borrowings see Enrico Magnelli, “Colluthus ‘Homeric’ Epyllion,” Ramus 37 (2008) 151–172, esp. 152–156. MARCEL LYSGAARD LECH 453 ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 64 (2024) 449–455 Furthermore, if we read b’s ἐξ ὀρέων, Colluthus cleverly emphasizes Paris’ future failure by echoing the simile in Il. 16.384–392,15 where Patroclus puts Hector and the Trojans to flight: as when Zeus in anger at the judgements of crooked judges (σκολιὰς κρίνωσι θέµιστας)16 creates a violent river from the mountains (ἐξ ὀρέων) to the sea (ἐς δ’ ἅλα), destroying what men have built (µινύθει δέ τε ἔργ’ ἀνθρώπων). It is no coincidence that Cheiron leaves the mountains and goes to the sea in order to celebrate the departure of the Argo- nauts, together with none other than Thetis and baby Achilles saying farewell to Peleus (Ap. Rhod. 1.553–558).17 This sort of trans-mythical and trans-chronological narrative is a typical feature of Colluthus’ intertextuality. But the intertextuality is extended further, since Colluthus clearly knows and expects his reader to know Quintus Smyr- naeus’ Posthomerica. The four instances of ἐξ ὀρέων in this work (three in the same sedes, one in second foot, all of which echo Homeric similes) generate a sequence of destruction from the death of Paris to the end of Troy: at 10.173 Philoctetes rushes against the Trojans before wounding Paris fatally, like a river from mountains; at 12.410 the demented Laocoon tries to warn his fellow Trojans about the wooden horse, crying like a river from mountains; at 13.45 Odysseus crawls out of the wooden horse as a wolf coming down from the mountains;18 and finally at 14.6 the Greeks enter Troy like a river from the mountain destroying everything in its path. Thus, the destruction of Troy is created by Paris exactly by leaving his mountains (ἐξ ὀρέων). 15 On this simile see Richard Janko, The Iliad. A Commentary IV (Cambridge 1994) 364–367. 16 Paris has been called θεµιστοπόλοιο in 5 and will judge (θεµιστεύσωσι) in 11. 17 Colluthus uses Jason extensively as a model for his Paris, see Cadau, Studies 74–77, 186–187, 198–204. The wedding of Peleus and Thetis is of course the first episode told by Colluthus. 18 See S. Renker, A Commentary on Quintus of Smyrna, Posthomerica 13 (Bamberg 2020) 65 ad 44–49 and 68 ad 45. 454 FROM THE MOUNTAINS TO THE SEA ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 64 (2024) 449–455 Therefore, with ἐξ ὀρέων the narrator offers a far more subtle and (sinister) ironic judgement on Paris, who is about to embark with his fatal ships (8–9 νηῶν ἀρχεκάκων) towards Sparta, to the destruction of his own home, as the river crushed everything made by men in the Homeric simile cited above. He is indeed τὸν ἀρχέκακον πολιήτην (392) and his movement is the cause of the disaster.19 Furthermore, retaining ἐξ ὀρέων gives verses 7 and 9 the chiasmus ἐξ ὀρέων … πόντον (7) / πόντον … γαῖαν (9),20 where the use of γαῖαν for the earth in general instead of the specific mountains around Troy imbues the passage with a disquieting feeling of universal doom (cf. Cypria fr.1.4).21 The contrast be- tween the mountains and the sea is emphasized later (201, ἄρτι µὲν Ἰδαίων ὀρέων ἠλλάξατο πόντον),22 but the mountains here also enable the reader to notice the pastoral atmosphere that the narrator seeks to create.23 The movement of Paris, from mountains to sea, contrasts with the movement of the Trojan 19 On this theme see Orestis Karavas, “Immobility and Motion in Col- luthus’ The Abduction of Helen,” Trends in Classics 12 (2020) 126–133. 20 This is clearly intentional since it is modelled on the Homeric formular γαῖαν ὁµοῦ καὶ πόντον· ὀρώρει δ’ οὐρανόθεν νύξ (Od. 5.294, 9.69, 12.315), while Colluthus plays with Quintus Smyrn. 3.707 and Nonn. Dion. 41.397. Like Quintus Smyrn. 3.707, he also switches γαῖαν ὁµοῦ καὶ πόντον to πόντον ὁµοῦ καὶ γαῖαν. Instead of the Homeric ὀρώρει, he echoes the sound ὀρ- (em- phatically in the Homeric precedent ὀρώρει … οὐρ-) by using the verb ὀρίνω (from Il. 2.294 ὀρινοµένη τε θάλασσα, 9.4 πόντον ὀρίνετον ἰχθυόεντα). Note how he transfers the Homeric πόντον ὀρίνει (Il. 11.298) to γαῖαν ὀρίνῃ. 21 And once again at 22 from the perspective of the gods: Ζεὺς µὲν ἀπ’ Οὐλύµποιο, Ποσειδάων δὲ θαλάσσης. A similar chiasmus is found in Clem. Al. Strom. 14.131: τρέµει δ’ ὄρη καὶ γαῖα καὶ πελώριος / βυθὸς θαλάσσης καὶ ὀρέων ὕψος µέγα (TrGF II 617; Aeschylus, according to Clement). 22 The narrator emphasizes that the paths on Mt. Ida are familiar to Paris (110 ἤθεα) as opposed to the sea, which is only emphasized by the Homeric formular βῆ δ’ ἐξ Ἰδαίων ὀρέων (six times, e.g. Il. 8.410, 15.79). 23 Cf. Cadau, Studies 37–42. Colluthus may also allude to Callimachus’ sepulchral epigram on the goatherd Astakides: Ἀστακίδην τὸν Κρῆτα τὸν αἰπόλον ἥρπασε Νύµφη / ἐξ ὄρεος (Callim. Epigr. 22 Pf.). MARCEL LYSGAARD LECH 455 ————— Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 64 (2024) 449–455 nymphs, whom the narrator summons from the river, the Xanthus, their father, which they often24 leave in order to dance on Ida (4 ἐς χορὸν Ἰδαίῃσιν, 7 ἐξ ὀρέων). It is indeed because of their coming so often to Ida, the mountains which Paris leaves, that they saw how Paris celebrated with Aphrodite after the beauty contest (13–16). Thus, Colluthus can create the chronological connection be- tween his poem and the fall of Troy through specific echoes of Homer, Apollonius, and Quintus Smyrnaeus, while simul- taneously creating the pastoral atmosphere of the Theocritean idyls, but how and to what effect is outside the scope of this note. June, 2024 University of Southern Denmark Copenhagen mlech@sdu.dk 24 πολλάκι, as opposed to Paris’ lack of experience of the sea.